Jemsek rolls a 7 (and 7 more) with Pine Meadow

    Writing from Chicago, Illinois
    Wednesday, November 28, 2012

    Welcome to the Morning Nine as the a warmer weekend – maybe the last decent weekend of the year to play golf – sneaks up on the Chicago area in particular and the state in general:
    1. Congratulations to the Jemsek organization for winning renewal of the lease for Pine Meadow Golf Course from the Archdiocese of Chicago after a year where it first appeared their tenure at the Mundelein gem, which commenced in 1985, would be up at the end of the season. (Billy Casper Golf had been the reported favorite.)
    Instead, the new deal – seven years with an option for as many more, according to Big Three member Rory Spears – will keep the Jemsek family in control of the course at least through 2019, and potentially through 2026.
    That’s important for two reasons. First, it allows an improvement program to continue. Jemsek has brought in Golf Maintenance Solutions to advise on clearing trees and bushes out from areas where they affect air flow, and thus course conditioning.
    Like too many American parkland courses, Pine Meadow is overgrown. Trees, bushes and other flora not only get in the way of shots from wayward golfers, they stop breezes from crossing the grounds. Shadows aside, that raises soil temperature, and on bentgrass, hot, stagnant air in the summer can lead to poor turf. The clearance program will help lead to better turf.
    Second, it keeps a course with some history in the hands of a family with a sense of history, rather than merely another bauble in an out-of-state corporate portfolio.
    Pine Meadow was brought out of decades of dormancy when Joe and Frank Jemsek won the lease for what had been St. Mary of the Lake Golf Course, the private course on the grounds of the Mundelein Seminary that Cardinal Mundelein brought in architect William Flynn to design in the 1920s. For the longest time, only six original holes were barely maintained. The Jemseks had Joe Lee and Rocky Roquemore use the many of the old corridors in bringing the old course back to life.
    For more on the renewal and the improvement plan, see Spears’ website: http://spears.golfersongolf.com/
    2. Speaking of old courses, The Old Course itself is getting a makeover, not that one was needed. The R&A, the tournament wing of the Royal & Ancient Golf Club of St. Andrews, somehow convinced the St. Andrews Links Trust – it runs the municipal layout on behalf of the citizens of the Auld Gray Toon – that changes on nine holes were needed to protect the course, or the British Open, from low scores when the tournament returns there in 2015.
    Huh? Two years ago, they had several tees so far back, a couple were on the New and Eden courses that run parallel to it, and the one on the 17th was across the road that swings back to run by the 17th green – a.k.a., the Road Hole, the hardest hole on the course. Winner Louis Oosthuizen finished at 16-under-par 272, seven strokes ahead of runner-up Lee Westwood. Rory McIlroy shot a 9-under-par 63 in the opening round, then ran into a squall line on Friday and posted an 80.
    The defense at St. Andrews has been the wind since the course evolved back in the 1400s. Now R&A boss Peter Dawson thinks it needs major changes – everything from an enlarged Road Hole greenside bunker to changing the contour of the 11th green, the famed “Eden” putting surface? Piffle.
    Here, posted Tuesday on Geoff Shackelford’s splendid website, is what Alister Mackenzie thought of tinkering with The Old Course: “St. Andrews differs from others in that it has always been deemed a sacrilege to interfere with its natural beauties, and it has been left almost untouched for centuries.”
    There have been changes over the centuries, of course. A change from 22 holes to 18 holes. The addition of alternate fairways and extra tees when golf became more popular – but the double greens remained. And the course used to be played backwards, which is to say, first tee to 17th green, 18th tee to 16th green, and so on. (It still is for a few days each spring.)
    But anything else? Well, a bunker was added in the 1940s.
    Here is Brad Klein, one of the foremost architecture experts, writing about architect Martin Hawtree’s plan and the process in general on www.golfweek.com:
    “So instead, Hawtree has been commissioned to reduce the slope of that section of (the 14th green). That’s not a complicated project. But it is an arrogant approach to design, and one that deserves far more public consideration and debate.
    “Instead, the R&A Championship Committee, working quietly with the Links Trust, has announced its intent to do surgery. This is no way to run a golf course, and certainly no way to preserve the ‘trust’ inherent in a sustodial relationship. The town effectively has ceded control of a treasured asset to a private group running its own golf championship.
    “I don’t know if these changes are all needed. What I do know is the reasons given for making them are unconvincing and not enough basis for tinkering with sacred ground.”
    Next thing you know, Donald Trump, who recently opened his own course on the coast of Scotland to mile acclaim, will be poking his nose around trying to gain an R&A membership.
    Here’s Tiger Woods, twice winner of the Open Championship (old school!) at St. Andrews, on the changes to the Road Hole.
    “I think 17 is hard enough as it is,” Woods said at his tournament in Thousand Oaks, Calif., recalling cosmetic changes to the Road Bunker. “I don’t think we need to make that bunker any deeper or bigger. They seem to keep changing 17 a lot. It’s a pretty hard hole. I think it’s the hardest one on that whole property.”
    Woods said he thought changes on the second and third holes made sense because bunkers are no longer in play. For him, perhaps, but what of the rest of the thousands who play The Old Course or yearn to play it at least once?
    Martin Dempster, golf writer for The Scotsman, wrote that The Old Course “is the one place that should be left untouched by any golf course architect’s knife.”
    But under attack it is. The work has already started. The ghost of Old Tom Morris will not be pleased. For photos, check out www.golfclubatlas.com.
    3. The Old Course construction controversy commenced with the R&A announcement on Friday. Another controversy, simmering in the game for years, reaches its peak this morning with the joint USGA/R&A announcement on anchoring the putter.
    Long putter devotees are ready to holler that they’ve been using the long putter for years. Those who think it an abomination will be counting the ways until the stroke, or the long putter, or both, go the way of the stymie.
    Bet on the long putter itself being ruled legal, but anchoring of any kind determined to be verboten, as of a couple of years from now. That way, no equipment manufacturer sues.
    The news conference – from that golf capital, Orlando, Fla., headquarters of Golf Channel – begins at 7:30 a.m. CT. Analysis runs until 11 a.m. CT.
    4. Meanwhile, the USGA has been studying the effect of distance – longer balls, hotter clubs, and so forth – for what, close to 20 years? No decision has been reached, but USGA equipment guru Dick Rugge is retiring after over 12 years at the helm. Hope he leaves his notes on the topic behind for the next fellow.
    So when will the big equipment study and potential rules to inhibit, shall we say,  unnatural length, be announced? Don’t wait up for it. It’s only going on two decades. Look how long it took the Roman Catholic Church to admit Galileo was right.
    5. Congratulations to the Western Golf Association for caddie scholarships on raising $400,000 in one night at its Green Coat Gala earlier this month. Three-time Western Open winner Tom Watson was the guest speaker, and was inducted into the WGA’s Caddie Hall of Fame. That puts Danny Noonan’s induction back at least one more year.
    Now comes the heavy lifting for the WGA, which is making the BMW Championship – i.e., the Western Open – a big deal again in the Chicago area. Perhaps moving to Conway Farms Golf Club will help, even if the tournament will be a tight squeeze on that footprint.
    When you draw 45,000 (10,000 more than this corner’s original estimate) on the final day at Crooked Stick after pulling in only 49,000 for the seven-day week at Cog Hill in 2011, some kind of change is needed.
    6. In a perfect world, the Western would be back at Butler National Golf Club in Oak Brook, but the all-male club recently voted to remain all-male by more than 60 percent. A 75-percent vote for changing the by-laws was needed to go co-ed.
    That not only keeps women from walking on the golf course, it keeps tournaments away from the front gate under the post-Shoal Creek rules of the PGA Tour, USGA, PGA of America and, yes, the LPGA. So much for a BMW, or the U.S. Open coming to Butler in the next generation or so – and the USGA has whispered that it would be at Butler yesterday if the club invited the USGA for an Open.
    That may find it harder to attract members in a world where family comes before getting away with the buddies for stag golf, but it’s curious to read that one member, speaking anonymously to the Chicago Tribune, said of Butler’s future, “We’re in a death spiral.”
    Really? That member should look at his club’s tax returns. As a non-profit operation, they’re public information, and the 2009 return, the most recent available, shows the club with assets of about $19.2 million, and having paid down a pair of loans down to $1.65 million from $2.075 million the year before. By any financial measure, Butler National is in good shape and can weather a brief storm.
    7. Sympathies to the families and friends of Chuck Chudek, publisher of Chicagoland Golfer in the 1960s, and former Northwestern Golf boss Nat Rosasco. Chudek, 82, and Rosasco, 83, died on Nov. 7 and Nov. 1, respectively. Each made a major contribution to furthering the game in the area, and, in Rosasco’s case, worldwide. No company sold more golf clubs than Northwestern when it was going full steam, and it did so for decades. Now, where’s that old Hubert Green-endorsed 1-iron we used to hit straight down the middle?
    8. Big Three sage and world traveler Len Ziehm has just come back from the Ozarks with fond memories of a round on Old Kinderhook, a course in Camdenton, Mo. Fun reading at http://lenziehmongolf.com/uncategorized/missouri-ozarks-old-kinderhook-is-the-place-to-go/
    9. Finally, Luke Donald, Chicago’s very own (adopted) superstar, made 90.2 percent of his putts inside 10 feet this year on the PGA Tour. That’s nothin’. We know some people that made 100 percent of their gimmes, many from about that far out.
    – Tim Cronin